Bookman's Alley Mural
Photos by Rudy Ruiz
Northwestern Senior Details Mural as Final Act of Service
By Rudy Ruiz
As Northwestern Senior Aimee Resnick prepared to graduate from Northwestern, she knew she wanted to contribute one last service project to Evanston. This project took the form of a mural located at Bookman’s Alley, 1712 Sherman Ave, which was revealed over the weekend.
The mural was a project of Northwestern Rotaract Club, an organization Resnick founded in 2022. The club is dedicated to personal development, friendship, and community impact through acts of service on a local and global level. She now serves as the club’s treasurer.
Past Rotaract projects in Evanston included a little free library in Raymond Park and planted shrubs in Clark St. Bird Sanctuary. Now, the mural is on display for all to see in downtown Evanston.
“About two years ago, I kind of started thinking about what I wanted my lasting impact on Evanston to be before I graduated. And I kind of decided I wanted to bring a mural somewhere into Evanston to help celebrate Rotary and celebrate all the wonderful community we have here. So I brought that back to the rest of our executive board with Rotaract, and they gave me the go-ahead to start fundraising,” Resnick told the crowd at the opening party.
Aimee began planning the mural during her junior year, at the end of 2023. The Rotaract executive board endorsed the project and fundraising began the following year.
Funding came from donations by Northwestern’s Buffett Institute and Student Philanthropy council combined with money gradually raised by Rotaract. Aimee even contributed some money from her own savings to the project.
Resnick reached out to Downtown Evanston’s executive director Andy Vick to scout locations for the mural. Vick then connected her with Steven Rogin, the property developer who is redeveloping Bookman’s Alley.
“Our [Downtown Evanston] role in this mural was actually very small,” Vick told the crowd. “Aimee reached out through a previous relationship I had with her and said, ‘Hey, we want to do a mural.’ And quite coincidentally, about a week or two before that, Steven had given me a tour of his new work here at the Varsity development. And, he mentioned, we talked a little about a mural perhaps, and then, so it was really kismet.”
NU Mariachi performers
Live music was performed by Chicago-based indie rock band Silver Ring, student band Neptune and Mariachi NU. Games of cornhole and Connect 4 were also played by both children and adults. Rotaract was also selling coffee to raise money for Northwestern’s sister school Haile Manas Academy in Ethiopia.
Later in the afternoon, property developer Steven Rogin spoke about the history of Bookman’s Alley dating back to 1980 by Roger Carlson, who owned the used bookstore of the same name. He thanked Downtown Evanston, Northwestern and Rotary International for getting the project off the ground and having it bring together integral parts of the community.
“Ultimately this is really a community space,” Rogin said. “That's our goal, that's our objective is to have it [be] a placemaking spot through the arts, through community, through restaurants, through music. So we're kind of touching on a lot of that today, and we hope that this is just the first of many to come.”
Artist Juan A. Cano spoke briefly about the mural, detailing the collaborative process with Resnick and Rogin. His mural was dedicated to Evanston’s residents and community through local landmarks, books representing literacy and butterflies symbolizing hope and remembrance.
Artist Juan A. Cano and his children
Dedication by Northwestern Rotaract
Attendees enjoying the mural
Rotaract co-presidents Angelo Karadimas and Zenobia Jordan spoke last, thanking everyone for attending. As co-founder and current junior at Northwestern, Jordan detailed Rotaract’s future as Resnick prepares to graduate. Jordan and Karadimas ensured a commitment to service on a local and international level.
“This mural is a reflection of our commitment to making the community around us a better place,” Resnick said. “We hope that this mural will spread joy across Evanston and bring people together, just as it has today.”